Atomic-scale design of friction and energy dissipation

Antonio Cammarata, Paolo Nicolini, Kosta Simonovic, Egor Ukraintsev, and Tomas Polcar
Phys. Rev. B 99, 094309 – Published 25 March 2019
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Abstract

Study of friction and energy dissipation always relied on direct observations. Actual theories provide limited prediction on the frictional and dissipative properties if only the material chemistry and geometry are known. We here develop a framework to study intrinsic friction and energy dissipation based on the only knowledge of the normal modes of the system at equilibrium. We derive an approximated expression for the first anharmonic term in the potential energy expansion which does not require the computation of the third-order force constants. Moreover, we show how to characterize the frequency content of observed physical quantities and individuate the dissipative processes active during experimental measurements. As a case study, we consider the relative sliding motion of atomic layers in molybdenum disulfide dry lubricant, and we discuss how to extract information on the energetics of sliding from atomic force microscopy signals. The presented framework switches the investigation paradigm on friction and energy dissipation from dynamic to static studies, paving avenues to explore for the design of alternative anisotropic tribological and thermal materials.

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  • Received 16 November 2018
  • Revised 13 March 2019

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.99.094309

©2019 American Physical Society

Physics Subject Headings (PhySH)

Condensed Matter, Materials & Applied Physics

Authors & Affiliations

Antonio Cammarata1,*, Paolo Nicolini1,†, Kosta Simonovic1, Egor Ukraintsev1,2, and Tomas Polcar1

  • 1Faculty of Electrical Engineering, Czech Technical University in Prague, Technicka 2, 16627 Prague 6, Czech Republic
  • 2Institute of Physics of the Czech Academy of Sciences, Department of Thin Films and Nanostructures, Cukrovarnicka 10, 16200 Prague 6, Czech Republic

  • *cammaant@fel.cvut.cz
  • nicolpao@fel.cvut.cz

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Issue

Vol. 99, Iss. 9 — 1 March 2019

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